Re: Should I upgrade my hardware?

[Pete Hall <peteh@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 09:40 12/03/1998 , Alan Novick wrote:
>I have a model 400-2132.  My disk utilization is near 75% so on the way
>to buying more disk I'm thinking this is a good time to look at buying a
>whole new machine. (Yes, I have taken measures to reduce what is
>occupying my disk).  My local vendor reccomends going to a 600-2135. 
>This is very nice, and the performance improvement is 68%.  The cost of
>the upgrade, with the increased disk, comes to $40,000.  We are a small
>company and this is a lot of money to my budget.  Regardless of the
>hardware decision, I will be upgrading from V3R7 to V4R3 or whatever
>they are at by the time I get the money :)  The other motivating factor
>is that right now I am dialing out to the Internet with a SLIP
>connection.  As I understand it, with a V4 operating system I can
>connect using PPP but only with the new hardware.  Another consideration
>for the decision is that I can't upgrade every year.  Maybe next year
>there will be an even cooler machine that I will want?

How important is the PPP? Could you accomplish the same thing with a gateway? 
Can you put a monetary amount on it? What kind of growth do you project over 
the next several years? How will that impact resource demands? Will new 
hardware give you a competitive edge? What about the impact of running older 
hardware on employee retention? If you fall too far behind the curve, your best 
people will probably not stick around. What does your CPU utilization look 
like? If it is high, what are your swap rates? Would more core bring them down? 
How is response time? If it's slow, it's costing you productivity. IBM did a 
study several years ago that quantifies the productivity increase achieved by 
subsecond response. I couldn't tell you where to find it though. Maybe someone 
else can. 

My take on it is this: Just because it's neat, doesn't mean you necessarily 
need it. You have a fiduciary responsibility to make the recommendation that 
maximizes the earning potential of the business. The toughest part is remaining 
objective, so it's probably best to assign your best guess value on all of the 
elements of the equation and see how it adds up.

hth
Pete

Pete Hall
peteh@inwave.com 
http://www.inwave.com/~peteh/

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